Tell My Story
We know that World War One took away many of Stockton's young fathers from their children - young men who never returned to see their children grow up. So what became of those children? Can you help us to tell their stories?
We are looking for volunteer family history detectives who can help to find out what life was like for the children left behind.
We'll publish your stories and discoveries - however detailed or brief - on this site.
Here are brief details of some of the children we'd like to know more about - in their own imagined words. If you'd like to volunteer to discover more, simply click the link for the child you'd like to.
For more information, please email pointmetotheskies@gmail.com
Agnes and William Anderton
"Hello, We're Agnes and William - sister and brother, and daughter and son of William Charles and Mary (formerly Mary Larkin).
"Growing up, our dad was a bit of a wanderer. He was born in 1883 in Gateshead, but please don't hold that against him. He then moved to Preston in Lancashire before settling in Stockton.
"He married our mother in 1907 and worked as an umbrella maker, which always sounded like a bit of a strange job to us.
"We lived in Brunswick Street but in 1916 Dad made his last umbrella and was conscripted into the Yorkshire Hussars. A year later he was dead - killed in Ypres. His body was never recovered from the battlefield and his name is now just one of many listed on the Menin Gate Memorial."
"If you'd like to do some research to find out what life was like for us and our family after dad died, please CLICK HERE."
Ivy Newlove
"Hello, I'm Ivy and I lived in Hutchinson Street in Stockton with my big sister Edna. My dad, John Robert - though everyone called him Bob - was an entrepreneur, not that I think anyone called him that back then. He ran his own window cleaning business - the Shinio Window Cleaning Company - and was a great dad.
"But when the war started, dad stopped cleaning windows and went away. I was only three at the time. Towards the end of the war, in the trenches of France, he was injured in the neck. They tried to save him but he died in the field hospital in May 1918. We know this because one of the men fighting alongside dad told us when he came back home.
Life without dad was hard for me, Edna and our mum Ada."
If you would like to find out more about Ivy and to tell her story please CLICK HERE
Leslie Stewart
"Hello. My name is Leslie and my dad was John William Stewart.
"He was a plumber from Stockton who became a war hero - no really, he won the Military Medal at the start of 1917. But he was killed a few months later. I think I was only seven or eight when he died; my brother Raymond was only six. Dad's buried in Belgium. Life after dad was hard for me, Raymond and our mum Emma.
If you would like to find out more about Leslie and to tell his story please CLICK HERE
Eleanor Skinner
"Hello, I'm Eleanor. That was my mother's name too.
"My dad was called Thomas and he was a journalist. He grew up at Pocklington, near York with my uncles Frank and Arthur and Aunties Ethel, Ada and Kate. My grandma and grandad were called Minnie and Atkinson Skinner.
"Dad moved to Stockton and that's where he married my mother in 1912. He signed up at Hartlepool to the 4th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment (Alexandra Princess of Wales's Own) service numbers 3842 and 201120.
"We hoped that Dad would make it through the war and it looked like he might come home but just before it allended he was killed in France on 6 October 1918. His body didn't come home either and he's buried in Glageon Communal Cemetery Extension, France."
"Will you tell my story and find out what life was like for me and my mother without dad? CLICK HERE "
Mary Elizabeth Malcolm
"Hello. I'm Mary and my parents were Joseph and Mary Alice.
"I was born before the war started when my dad was busy working in the shipyard. But then my dad joined the Royal Navy. He was serving as a stoker on the HMS Queen Mary, along with two of his brothers, my uncles Charles and John, when their ship was attacked during the Battle of Jutland.
"At exactly 4.26pm on 31st May 1916, the German battle cruiser Derfflinger, attacked HMS Queen Mary. There was a huge explosion, the ship sank and everyone on board died - including my dad and my uncles. "
Can you find out what life was like for Mary after her dad died? If you'd like to tell her story please CLICK HERE
The Blackburn Children
"Hello, we're Mary, George, Lilian, Albert and Thomas Blackburn, and we'd like you to tell our story.
"We lost our dad, Henry, in World War One. He's buried alongside the men he served with at the Somme. Before he died our dad was a skilled craftsman - a French polisher. He'd always lived in Stockton, brought up by our grandparents George and Emma Blackburn. He had two sisters, our aunties Caroline and Annie and they'd all lived at 6 Lindsay Street.
"On 27th March 1911 he married our mother, Catherine Holiday, in Stockton. We lived at 11 Gayles Street before dad went off to war with the Yorkshire Regiment (Alexandra Princess of Wales's Own). He later transferred to the Duke of Wellington's (West Riding Regiment) .
"Dad was killed on 6th March 1917 and is buried in La Neuville Communal Cemetery, Corbie, Somme, France."
"Life was hard for our mother - and for us - without dad. If you'd like to find out more about us and tell our story, please CLICK HERE."
John Bertram Bentley Bainbridge
"Hello, I'm John. I was born just a train ride away from Stockton in Darlington on 31st August 1912.
"My dad, Bertram had been born in Stockton in 1890 but as a young man moved to Richmond in North Yorkshire where he lived in lodgings and worked as a book keeper. It was while he was in Richmond that he met my mother, Nellie Pidgeley and they got married in the town the year before I came along.
"To be honest I never really knew my dad because before I was three years old he was fighting in France with the 25th (Tyneside Irish) Battalion, Northumberland Fusiliers.
He was killed on 21st March 1918 at the last Battle of the Somme. His body was never found but you can see his name on the plaque of the old Stockton-on-Tees Secondary School, now Grangefield School."
If you'd like to investigate what life was like for John, growing up without his dad, please CLICK HERE
George and Lilian Braithwaite
"Hello, we're George and Lilian. We grew up at Headlam Street and Langley Street in Stockton with our mother Ellen and our dad William.
"Dad was a barber in the town but in 1915 signed up to the 9th.Battalion Yorkshire Regiment (Alexandra Princes of Wales's Own). He was killed the next year, on 7 October, at the Battle of the Somme, and his body never came home."
"We'd like you to learn more about us and what our lives were like without our dad. If you'd like to adopt us, please CLICK HERE "
Kathleen Southall
"Hello, I'm Kathleen. My mother and father, John and Mary, were both Yorkshire folk but I grew up in Norton.
"Dad had grown up in a pub in Huddersfield where his dad, my granddad James was the landlord. Dad was a bit of a journeyman, travelling around finding work here and there in domestic service roles. In 1901 he was living and working in Hartlepool, in 1909 he and mam married in West Yorkshire and by 1911 we were all living at 19 The Green in Norton where dad was working as a Coachman Domestic.
"He knew a lot about animals and joined the Army Veterinary Corps. He was killed on 10 July 1917 and his final resting place is the Coxyde Military Cemetery, Belgium."
As the child of a domestic servant, what did the future hold for Kathleen after her dad was killed. If you'd like to find out more, please CLICK HERE